


Tell me did you mind the cold?

by Aylwyyn228



Category: Captain America (Movies)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Aphasia, Depressed Steve Rogers, Dissociation, Happier Than It Sounds, Hurt/Comfort, Implied/Referenced Self-Harm, M/M, Mental Health Issues, Misunderstandings, Post-Captain America: The Winter Soldier, Steve Rogers is a drama queen and so am I
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-01-17
Updated: 2019-01-17
Packaged: 2019-10-11 10:59:23
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,384
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17445626
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Aylwyyn228/pseuds/Aylwyyn228
Summary: Bucky wasn't getting better.He was trying, Steve knew. God knows, he knew.Bucky still didn't talk. And it broke Steve's heart a little bit more every day.Catatonia, Sam had said. Maybe dissociation.Fancy words, sure, but none of it changed the fact that Bucky was lost so deep inside himself that Steve couldn't find him.Steve might never find him.On darker days Steve wondered if he was even there at all.





	Tell me did you mind the cold?

**Author's Note:**

> This is totally self-indulgent, I'll admit it. I was feeling angsty. Hopefully, I managed to inject a skeleton of plot!
> 
> Hand-wavy science throughout. Research, there was not.

 

Bucky wasn't getting better. 

He was trying, Steve knew. God knows, he knew. 

Bucky still didn't talk. And it broke Steve's heart a little bit more every day. 

Truth be told, he didn't do much of anything. 

Just sat, in silence, in the dark, in his own head. 

Catatonia, Sam had said. Maybe dissociation. 

Fancy words, sure, but none of it changed the fact that Bucky was lost so deep inside himself that Steve couldn't find him. 

Steve might never find him. 

On darker days Steve wondered if he was even there at all. 

He would focus if you get his attention, frowning, faint lines showing up on his forehead as he concentrated. Sometimes he would shake at Steve’s wrist, or tap at his shoulder, but then his mouth would downturn and he’d make this broken noise and Steve wouldn’t know what the fuck he was supposed to do.

When he was alone, when Steve wasn't filling his time with inane conversation, he would slip into that blank look, eyes empty.

Steve had never seen anyone look so lost. It made him just want to gather him up.

But he couldn’t.

He wouldn’t, ever.

Because Steve had read endless essays on fawn response, and trauma, and co-dependency. And Steve couldn’t even articulate how angry he was.

It made Steve physically shake, because every time Steve lost his temper, every time he let the upset overflow, Bucky would sidle over to him, running hands over his arms, across his chest.

One time he even dropped to his knees.

Christ, it made Steve feel sick. What they must’ve done to him. Made him do.

He hated it. Hated the thought of it.

What he hated most was that he still wanted it. He still wanted Bucky close to him, but he loved him too much. Too much to take advantage of him.

But it made him ache, the distress on Bucky’s face. The way Steve was confusing him. Hurting him.

It made Steve want to die.

***

Steve woke up from dreams that were erratic and lost as soon as he opened his eyes.

He breathed, and tried to catch onto the wisps of memory, right before he realised that there was a bit of gloom in the corner of the room that was slightly darker than the rest.

“Buck?” He was instantly awake. “You need anything, pal?”

There was no answer. Steve reached over, slowly, to flick on the light at his bedside.

“Oh, Buck…”

Bucky wasn’t looking at him, staring at something in the far off distance. He was slumped on the floor against the wall, looking about as far from a deadly assassin as it was possible to look. In the soft pants and t-shirt Steve had dressed him in the night before.

There were bright scratches showing up along his jaw, across his throat. Deeper gouges into the flesh around his shoulder, disappearing beneath the cotton of his shirt.

New scars to add to old.

Steve pushed himself gently out of the bed, toes curling against the cold floor, and padded over to Bucky. He crouched at his side. “You ok, buddy?”

He reached up to brush against the base of his jaw, turn his head a fraction. The scratches weren’t too bad, dipping deep enough in a couple of places to break the skin. But nothing like the gouges on his shoulder which were spotting blood through the thin fabric covering them.

Steve sighed, felt tears prickling at the back of his eyes. It felt endless.

It was endless.

Bucky wasn’t there. Hadn’t been since they’d found him. An empty broken thing, waiting for instruction, abandoned when Hydra fled their last refuge.

He’d fought, they’d found later, when Nat had sifted through the CCTV footage she’d managed to locate. There’d been no sound, but they’d had to drag him back into the base. He’d been shouting, snarling, recognisable as the man Steve had fought across the Helicarrier.

Recognisable as the man who pulled back at the last moment. Who’d fished him out of the Potomac.

His Bucky.

Not like _this_.

It was Sam’s guess that they’d tried to recondition him again. For the final time.

Tried. 

Steve swiped a hand across his eyes. “Come on, pal.” 

He shifted position to try and pull Bucky to his feet, but he was met with an unresisting slump. Steve stroked over the back of his hair. “Alright, sweetheart, alright.”

It was no hassle for Steve to lift him. Not anymore.

And it wasn’t as if Bucky hadn’t done the same for him, when his breath and his back and his heart wouldn’t carry him up the three flights of stairs in their block.

He gathered Bucky against his chest as he stood, carefully, and carried him into the bathroom. Settled him on the closed toilet. Bucky’s hand had closed against his shirt, and Steve gently disentangled his fingers. His nails were chipped and pulled back. Bloodied.

Sam said that it was a good sign, that Bucky always came to him, always. Whether he knew who he was or not, Bucky associated him with safety.

Steve didn’t know whether it was a good sign or not, what he did know is that it made him want to cry.

He pressed a kiss to the back of Bucky’s knuckles. “Ok, bud. Let’s clean you up.”

He snagged a washcloth off the side. Gave a cursory wipe over Bucky’s jaw and throat, before turning his attention to his hand.

He would have to make sure he kept Bucky’s nails filed short. He should have thought about it before. It wasn’t as if it was the first time. He should’ve checked.

He felt tears again. Swiped them away.

“Ok, I’m just going to clean up your shoulder.”

But as he reached for the hem of his t-shirt, Bucky started making a low noise, like a frightened animal. He was still looking into the distance, eyes vacant but his bottom lip had pulled in.

“What’s the matter, sweetheart?”

Bucky switched down a pitch but didn’t let up. Steve stroked his hair again, lingering on his neck as if that could get Bucky to look at him.

“Ok, shirt stays on, darlin.”

He stood up and pulled the edge of his collar down instead, wiping very gently over the already healing cuts.

Steve very deliberately kept his movements steady. Even when Bucky’s face pressed into his stomach, and his hand came up around his back.

“There ya go, Buck. There ya go.”

By the time he’d finished, Bucky was holding tightly onto him, like a lifeboat. Steve pulled back and looked down into wide grey eyes. On him. Focussed.

“Hey, bud,” Steve rubbed his thumb over the soft skin of Bucky’s cheek, “you back?”

Bucky’s eyes were wide.

He matched Steve’s movement, swiping the moisture from his cheeks.

God, Steve couldn’t bear those eyes. Christ help him, but sometimes he thought it would be better if Bucky were truly gone.

It was this wraith that Steve couldn’t bear.

This sad, lost ghost.

Who tore at his own skin, and cried silently for hours, lost so deep inside his own mind that Steve couldn’t find him.

His beautiful shadow.

Bucky’s hand dropped from his cheek to his wrist, squeezing tightly.

“What is it, darlin?”

Bucky squeezed again, tugged his wrist towards him.

“I don’t know what you want.”

The corner of Bucky’s lip was downturned, upset. He reached towards Steve’s face again and Steve ducked backwards. “No, darlin, you don’t have to do that.”

Bucky made an unhappy noise.

Steve caught his hand, tugged him to his feet. “Come on. Let’s get something to eat.”

Instantly, he felt Bucky cleave against his back, in supplication, pressing lips against the back of his neck.

Christ, did they make him think he had to pay for it?

“No,” Steve said, shortly, “don’t do that.”

Bucky pulled away instantly.   

Steve tugged Bucky along just enough to get him into the living room, and then left him while he went to see what was in their sparsely stocked kitchen. He always felt guilty when he looked, aware that he was failing at one of the basic necessities of being an adult human.

His ma woulda been clicking her tongue at him.

Bucky had always done all that, complaining that while there was breath in his body, he was never eating another of Steve’s boiled stews.

He could see him now. Standing at the basin, with his shirt sleeves rolled up and a cigarette hanging out of his mouth, violently peeling potatoes.

Steve had to stop for a moment to press his knuckles into his eyes.

There was a soft brush against his elbow. A murmur that sounded like a question.

“I’m alright, Buck.” He swiped at his eyes before meeting Bucky’s. “I promise.”

He squeezed Bucky’s hand, and shot him a smile. It didn’t take the worry off Bucky’s face, but then he was still tense.

“Go on and sit down, I’ll be there.”

Bucky sighed deep, but he did go.

Steve watched him as he padded over to the sofa, then opened up the fridge and kinda wanted to die a little. Or at least just sit on the floor and cry.

He couldn’t do anythin. Couldn’t even hold it together in front of Bucky.

He should call Sam.

He should.

The thing was that he knew Sam’d be on the first flight down.

Sam was a good guy like that.

And Steve didn’t deserve a second of it.

It was more than that though, he didn’t want Sam knowing what a mess he was.

He hadn’t showered in more than a week. His t-shirt been the cleanest one he could find on his bedroom floor, and he’d slept the last two nights in it.

The worst part was that it didn’t even make him want to get his shit together. He felt guilty about it, but he seemed to take a perverse pleasure in watching himself fall apart.

Like it was a penance.

Like it would prove somethin.

He was falling into the abyss and he didn’t give one solitary shit.

He felt it again, the urge to just lay down on the floor.

And what would it matter really, who would know if he did? Who would care?

He heard the pad of Bucky’s footsteps across the carpet in the sitting room. There was chirp as he switched the speaker on, and a whine as he tried to catch Steve’s attention. 

Steve swiped at his eyes. “I’m comin, Buck.”

Bucky had always liked music. Steve remembered him saving up his pay to pick up an old Philco radio. It only worked half the time, but Bucky would always have the swing programmes playing when he could.

Steve sucked in a breath and leaned into the fridge, more than willing to spiral into memories.

Bucky was playing with the application, like he always did until he found something that caught his interest, flicking through the first three seconds of the tracks that had been mostly set up for him by Sam.

Steve hadn’t really explored them.

Then Bucky stopped flicking through and Steve felt a shiver run over him as a few opening bars filled the room.

He spun around.

Bucky was hovering just in front of the speaker. Switching his weight between his feet.

_Heaven, I’m in heaven…_

That goddamn song. Bucky had been obsessed with it ever since they’d seen Top Hat at the flicks. For months, every time Steve’d got riled up about somethin, he’d put that goddamn song on and try and get Steve to dance with him.

“Buck?”

He lost his voice as Bucky held out his hand.

Bucky wasn’t looking at him, was staring into the corner, but it wasn’t empty… it was… shy.

His hand was steady.

Steve had never ever turned Bucky down.

He’d closed the distance before he’d ever thought, taken Bucky’s hand. Bucky caught his waist instantly, and then they were dancing.

Bucky, as weightless as ever, Steve like a concussed donkey. But he didn’t care.

Laughter bubbled up in his throat.

He could feel Bucky smiling, feel it through every place their bodies were in contact. Feel every inch of the warm press of him.

He managed about twelve steps before he stumbled over Bucky’s feet.

He laughed again, just about managed to keep them both on their feet. Bucky’s eyes were full of mirth. “Sorry, pal, I’m still not much of a Ginger to your Fred.”

Without missing a beat, Bucky switched their positions, hands dropping lightly onto Steve’s shoulder.

Steve snorted. “Alright, pal. I ain’t any better leadin.”

He let himself be swept around until the song started winding towards its climax and Bucky abruptly started leaning backwards. Steve staggered. “Bucky, no. Buck, I’m gonna drop you! Buck!”

Bucky caught himself at the last moment, with a laugh, and dragged Steve back upright. Before Steve could catch his breath, Bucky’s lips were on his.

Soft and chaste and wanting. Steve could feel his breath as they pulled back slightly, and after all these years he hadn’t forgotten the taste of him. The way he felt and the way he smelt.

“Buck-“

He was cut off again as Bucky kissed him softly, thumbing over the side of his jaw.

Steve finally pulled away. “Buck, you remember that?”

There was a slight curl of Bucky’s lip, one that could Steve could read without any words at all.

Steve cupped his jaw. “Are you..? All this time?”

Bucky grunted, tilted his head a little, tightened his jaw.

“Hey,” Steve let his hand slip up into Bucky’s hair, he could feel his throat start to close up, “I’m sorry, it’s my fault. I shoulda… I thought I lost you. I couldn’t…”  

There was that unhappy noise again. Bucky squeezed at his wrist again, shook it hard.

Steve felt himself smile. “You tellin me to buck up, pal?”

Bucky lifted his hand to tap against the side of Steve’s temple, and Steve laughed wetly. “Always did get caught up in my own head.”

Bucky hummed in approval.

“Just need you to remind me, huh?”

Bucky didn’t answer, just dropped a kiss right on the tip of his nose.

Steve was pretty sure that meant ‘damn straight’.

 

**Author's Note:**

> So New Year's bullshit is that I'm gonna try and actually use Tumblr to actually talk about writing, so yeah ---> https://aylwyyn228.tumblr.com/ 
> 
> Say hi if you want!


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